Summer Cut Northern Hardwoods

4x4American · September 16, 2016, 07:17:47 AM

lol lol

I don't remember it sawing bad at all up to those spots. But it was smooth bark, I know that cutting shag bark with a chainsaw is about like using a butter knife.

sandsawmill14 · September 16, 2016, 07:26:45 AM

there is several types of hickory but down here the shags are where the high grade lumber comes from and is the only kind i ever tried to saw

i have never sawn any pecan

but i plan to if i get the chance just so i can see if it is worse than the shags if it is it will take me 1 blade 1 cut

so 1 slab will be about all i cut >:( :D :D :D

YoungStump · September 16, 2016, 07:06:28 PM

I've noticed too that some hickory cuts much harder than others, in my experience logs that are a high percentage sapwood cut extremely hard while ones that are mostly heartwood normally saw fine. I know we get several different types of hickory and I don't have them all straight but I think shagbark is one of the worst to saw, the logs are debarked before I saw them so it's kinda hard to keep track of them that way.

sandsawmill14 · September 17, 2016, 12:32:51 AM

dont worry another 15-20 years you can tell all of them apart when you get the first slab ;) here the the high grade is mostly shag bark and the best logs are almost all white i have seen some 24" logs that would still have the white on the cant when sawed down to a 4x6 next time we get some good hickory in i will try to remember to get some pics its not uncommon for a 20" log to only have a 3" red heart but you also get a lot of logs with only about 3-4" of white around a 16" heart these are only good for ties or pallet stock

4x4American · September 17, 2016, 09:11:06 AM

Good to know Sands, so when buying hickory logs for grade I'll make sure that they're 1/3 heart or so

YoungStump · September 17, 2016, 02:48:41 PM

That's different than here for sure, a lot of the logs that saw out the best for grade are the ones with lots of heart wood. I might be able to find some pics, we get a lot of hickory that is neither shagbark or smooth. I hear so many different names for hickory thrown around that I can't keep track of what's what shagbark, shellbark, pig hickory, smoothbark, mockernut etc.

YoungStump · September 17, 2016, 03:44:52 PM

This was some mean sawing hickory I don't remember how the grade was on it.

This type of hickory usually saws easy and does real well on grade unless it's full of bark pockets which is pretty easy to tell by looking at the ends, it also seems to split worse than other hickory.